Monday, September 25, 2017

Not much to see here, folks, just a practice run at making GLOGspellsusing the ever-effective Araki Method of Power Naming.

1)
Knights of Cydonia

R:
20’ T: Point D: [sum] rounds

You
summon [dice]-HD worth of rust-armored warriors from distant Cydonia
and Tharsis. The rounds of activity are shared among all knights
summoned.

2)
Toxicity

R:
Touch T: A container of liquid D: [dice] hours

You
turn the liquid murky and foul for the appointed time: anyone
drinking or touching it must save vs. poison. If [sum]>8, the
change is permanent.

3)
Get a Hold of Yourself

R:
Touch T: Person D: [sum] rounds

Breaks
target out of fear. They will resist fear for [sum] rounds.

4)
Gold on the Ceiling

R:
50’ T: Gold and all other valuables D: [sum] minutes

Any
item within range worth at least 1 gp will fly up into the air and
become stuck on the ceiling. If no ceiling is present, the items will
hover 30’ in the air until the effect expires.

5)
Get Along Gone

R:
50’ T: [dice] persons D: 1 minute

[Dice]
people are enveloped in a cloud of smoke, accompanied with a bright
light and loud bang, permitting escape from combat.

6)
Landsick

R:
20’ T: Person D: [sum] rounds

Target
is overcome with powerful nausea, vomiting if 2 dice or more are
invoked. Effect will only take place if the target is on solid
ground; they will be immune if in the water or on a water.

7)
Destroy the Past

R:
Self T: Self D: As long as you can hold your breath

You
are transported to the same location at a specified point in time
within a range of [sum]x10 years. This will last as long as the
player can hold their breath – breathing will result in
returning to the present. All changes to the present will be
applicable after the caster returns.

8)
Promises of Sanctuary

R:
Sight T: House or other shelter D: Until dawn

Target
building is protected against evil intrusions of up to [dice] HD. If
[sum] > 6 there will be fresh firewood, if >8, warm bedding, if
>10, a hot meal, if >16 the Sanctuary Nymph will reveal
herself.

9)
Walk like an Egyptian

R:
Self T: Self D: [Sum] rounds

You
are rendered two dimensional upon a surface you are touching. You
cannot move between adjacent objects unless 3+ dice are invested.

10)
Whiteout Conditions

R:
15’ x [dice] T: Person D: [dice] minutes

Target
is enveloped in a blinding snowstorm, centered on their body. The
storm will follow them, though anyone else trapped in it will be able
to escape normally.

11)
Burn Burn

R:
20’ T: Book D: Instant

The
targeted book goes up in flames. This fire is limited to the book and
will not spread elsewhere. If a spellbook is burned, the caster has a
[dice]-in-6 chance of learning a new spell if the ashes are eaten.

12)
Obey the Beard

R:
Touch T: Beard D: [sum] minutes

The
target’s facial hair is awakened, and those listening it will be
compelled as if under a Command spell. The awakened hair will
always have the same identity, being that of Big Jimbo Holhms, a
lumberjack known for his over-excitable imagination and love of
activities that cause concussions.

13)
Body

R:
30’ T: Person D: [dice] hours

Target’s
body is separated into component parts, organ systems, and other
structures. These might be safely moved about without causing harm to
the target. Target will be aware of what is going on, but will feel
no pain. There is a [sum] in 10 chance of summoning 1d4
alternate-universe versions of the target’s mother as observers.

The
corpses, if strung up from gallows, will act as an oracular chorus to
passersby: delivering warnings, compliments, advertisements, musical
numbers and trivial information.

15)
Word Crimes

R:10’ T: Visible Text D: 1 hour

Affected text will be changed so as to reference significant criminal
behavior (usually of a humorous nature. If 2+ dice are invested, any
individual of a criminal profession (thieves, assassins, drug
peddlers, lawyers) will give great respect to the individual
possessing altered text, for as long as the effect holds. After that,
it’s up to smooth talk.

16)
Fly Me To The Moon

R: Touch T: Person D: Instant

Target is instantly transported to a visible location on the moon.
Any additional items beyond clothing and small objects requires an
additional die of investment. Don’t use it on a new moon.

17)
Way Down We Go

R: 30’ T: Multiple Persons D: [dice] combats

All effected persons have advantage for checks against fear, morale,
or stress (as applicable) for [dice] combat encounters. This spell is
only effective the first time a specific dungeon is entered.

18)
Ventricide

R: Touch T: Person D: Instant

If 4+ dice are invested, the target’s heart explodes.

19)
Coalescence

R: 20’ T: Corpse of ooze D: Permanent

The caster will create a rainstorm within the effect area, which will
wash the remnants of the ooze to the space in front of the caster,
ready for harvesting.

20)
Hallelujah Money

R:
30’ T: Person D: [sum] rounds

Target
is beset by seizures as an angel appears and showers them with [dice]
x1000 false gold pieces, and scraps of paper bearing the visages of
long-dead kings. The target must pass a WIS check to resist the urge
to cease their current activities and founding a religion with a
healthy appreciation for tithing.

Thursday, September 21, 2017

In
Liang Bua, it’s traditional to leave out bowls of rice wine and
baked sweet potatoes by the family shrine every full moon, so that
they might scare off evil spirits with the sound of their happy
feasting.

In
Warchest’r Shire, the first bottle of a fresh batch of garum-sauce
is taken out past the old stone bridge and left in a basket at the
edge of the woods, as payment for saving the life of the good king
Wenceslas’ infant son.

In
Old Alegh, soldiers on patrol always keep a few marbles or dandelion
heads in their pockets to put in the crooks of old trees’ roots, to
make amends for the blood shed at Crowshead Creek.

No
matter where one goes in the world, there will always be the Little
People. Hauflins, florens, halfamen, puckwudgies, hobbledehoys and
halflings. Half the size of a man, or just about the size of a child,
folk say they live up in the mountains, deep in the jungle, just over
the next hill.

They
exist, there’s no doubt about that. The people of Liang Bua wake up
to find their wine and potatoes gone, and are untroubled by wicked
spirits. The garum factory in Warchest’r will find broken tools
mended overnight. The forests of Old Alegh are a place of rest for
men tired of the wars past the mountains.

Many
men confuse them for Folk, but this is not true. They are
Folk-friends, perhaps the most so of all the races of men (Goblins in
particular, as they share a puckish humor), but men they are to the
end; The Little People know the Humble Art, and remember when Mother
and DOG led them through the snow, as befitting an elder race of man.

Few
ever directly cross paths with the Little People: their villages are
hidden by geography and subtler arts, and they themselves are quiet
as shadows. They rarely travel abroad, and in those rare cases it is
usually because they have been roped into some adventure or another
by someone else. This is occasionally referred to among their
villages as being “off to see the wizard.”

Playing
as the Little People

Your
HD, XP, saves, and class abilities remain unchanged. The following
traits may be added.

Hauflin
Hole

There is a village out there that your heart calls home. The world of
bigmen is good for an adventure or two, but in time you will return
to the place you were born. Roll below:

A comfortable, clean warren beneath a hill, among the roots of an
old rowan tree. Guarded by a one-eyed badger named Old Battleaxe.

A temple complex overtaken by the jungle. Tents and huts set up
among the statues of devas and boddisatvas. The serpent who lives in
the reservoir could eat a water buffalo whole.

A longhouse in the mountains, at the end of a path erased by a
landslide. Memories of smoked fish and warm furs, skiing down the
slopes and riding the goats back up.

A wooded island in the middle of a placid lake. You spent your days
fishing with your grandfather.

A cave behind a waterfall, at the end of a valley. The stream above
was glacier runoff, meaning that any home

Just over the next ridge of hills. From the top of the church
steeple you can barely make out the willows by the river and the
apple orchards by Miller Tad’s.

Out
of Sight, Out of Time

For all the simplicity of their lives, the little folk have a
tendency to collect objects that don’t seem to belong to the place,
nor the time: a pocketwatch, a newspaper, a telegram from one’s
aunt, an umbrella, a booklet of stamps, licorice candies, mothballs,
rubber galoshes, and so on. You will have at least one of these items
in your possession upon leaving home, and might find another during
your travels. (If the original is lost, or every other level as
desired)

Riddles

The Little People adore riddle games. Your opponent must pass an INT
check to guess your answer (or you can try and stump your DM), but
you must write your riddles yourself.

Example:

Off playing chess near a red velvet field

White king lost his crown and knelt there to yield

His hair’s all turn’d black

By the shock of attack

And pain now the kingdom’s been deal’d.

On
My Mother’s Side

The Little People have large families, and so you most certainly know
someone, or you know someone who knows someone, who is relevant to
whatever is at hand. You can use this to get a piece of information,
a helpful tool, a translator, or a guide, once per adventure.

This place is apparently an actual pub now. Probably overpriced as hell, but I appreciate the effort.

Monday, September 18, 2017

Modular design is great. You find something you like, find a place for it on the map, cross it over with something else, and eventually you have your own personalized sandbox adventure world.This map was all pieced together in Hexographer under the auspices of Sunday afternoon and is filled with a wide variety of stuff I like. I might use it in the future, I might not, maybe someone else will - regardless, it was a fun way to spend an afternoon.

Also, there are way too many talented people out there. This map features:

Band of pilgrims – We crossed paths with a sizable and rowdy company, and the meeting was agreeable all around. A member of their party was going on and on about writing a grand story about it all, though he did not seem a particularly reliable character to me.

Hedge Knight & Squire – With the war dragging on, it was not uncommon to find deserters and masterless knights plying their services for a few coins.

Holy Fool – They are, save some hooting and hollering at your expense, harmless. It is best to agree with their jeers, laugh along, and perhaps leave them something to eat. Good treatment of one of the mad innocents goes over well in the community.

Questing Beast – Head of a snake, body of a leopard, voice like a pack of baying hounds. An ever-popular target among knights errant and eccentric. I met many who had gone out is search of it, and the contraptions and techniques they utilized were singularly mad.

Termagant – No one I have spoken to is quite sure what this creature is, but all agree that it is some terrible man-eating beast worshiped as a god in foreign parts, wherever that may be. Claws like swords, burning eyes, and teeth like shields are also agreed upon.

A very clever goat – I swear upon Skarl’s red drum this goat was following me. Three towns I saw it in, and each time it was standing alone in the road ahead, staring at me!

Sword Naiad – Native to freshwater lakes, they are boisterous and combative, and love throwing swords at people on the shore. They will avoid doing so for young girls, and instead hand them the swords directly.

Snail Errant – Two and a half to three feet tall at the shell, they get into places that snails are not meant to go. One might find them stuck to the ceiling of a cottage, crawling through the pews in church, or saddling up to joust.

“Dragon” - The king’s spectacular trophy was, alas, little more than a stuffed and mounted alligator. I declined to tell him this, as he was as giddy as a schoolboy about it.

Actual Dragon – A majestic creature, and made all the more majestic by putting significant distance between myself and it.

Beast with Two Bellies – These perfumed chimeras wander the streets, offering their many services for coin. Unlike most in Adura, they are free from masters or obligations.

Tortured Oliphaunt – Long years in the Colosseum had broken this magnificent creature. Even its retirement now to a nobleman’s garden could bring no relief, as passersby find it amusement to throw trash into its enclosure.

Devil-Worshipper – Devil cults come in two varieties: those that shed blood to avoid notice, and those that shed blood to be noticed. They love nothing more than fighting each other, as it one side is dying for the sake of the other no matter how it’s looked at.

Slave Neonate – People recently and forcibly invested in a mystery cult. Utterly obedient to their superiors, cruel and violent when left to their own devices. Eat a specialized diet soaked in mind-altering substances. Eyes lack pupil or iris, being an ever-shifting mix of colors. Popular among the nobility as servants and guards of their latifundia.

Escaped White Lion – Its eyes rolled with desperate panic as it tore through the marketplace. I could see the gashes in its hide where the demons possessing it had begun to leak.

Deserter Legionnaires – Deserters are everywhere, and hunted often for sport as much as law. Several of the bands claim to wear their old colors in loyalty for a supposed heir building strength out in the wilderness, but that is unlikely as clean or as clear as claimed.

Underpaid, bored mercenaries – The noble houses of Adura tend to hire from Terc, Grancia, and Carabrandt, offering promises of gold and narcotics. They deliver on their promises, but never enough.

Unbound House God – Chaos-banking practices have left the a great number of fabulous villas to rot. Without a family to tend the hearth, the inhabiting lares inevitably go mad.

Equine Senator – The madman made his horse a senator, and the beast is the best statesman in the country. I spent an entire afternoon listening to a horse make whinnying noises to a crowd in the forum and I cheered.

The Emperor, mid-assassination – As I heard it: “The emperor passed by an oracle one day, and was warned of the day of his death. He took the warning to heart and has been leading his assassins on a chase for the last forty years, or thereabouts.”

Somewhere inside, books are being thrown and a senator is being hit over the head with a chair leg.

Doughboy – The Republic used these homunculi as foot soldiers a generation or so ago. Most have retired now: you’ll find a few still as soldiers or police, but more often I saw them as handymen, farmers, or day laborers.

Tyrannocygnus Rex – There’s no beast nastier in all the Great White North. Their migration south leaves a path of destruction made worse by the return trip – livestock devoured, trees torn up, shit everywhere. The government pays a bounty per head.

Baron Blue Aurochs – Along the frontier it’s common enough to see wagons the size of houses pulled by these beasts. They are surprisingly well-tempered, leading to their usage as mascot for logging companies and inns up and down the Tinnemank Line.

Melon Heads – According to folklore, they are the inbred offspring of some of the first colonists and the Locals. Potentially true, though I am uncertain. Less uncertain is that the meanest witches in all the Republic hail from their mountain villages in the backwoods of coalmining country.

Jersey Cow Devil - The cow stood up on its hind legs, let out a shriek as if a woman dying, and beat in her farmer’s skull with a hoof. By the time Hans and Harold had run out of the barn she had already flown off on blood-slick wings.

Montauk Monster – A hairless, beaked thing that will wash up on riverbanks and beaches. After a few hours of apparent death, it will animate, grow black and gray striped fur, and trundle off into the woods. I have yet to find one dead of natural causes.

Minuteman – A sort of embossed metal plate with a ghost trapped inside it. They are equipped with saber and musket, but can only maintain their form a minute at a time after they have been triggered. Used during the forming of the Republic.

Thunder Eagle – Primarily white, with brown and red stripes on the flight feathers. Produces thunderclaps when it beats its wings.

The Cracked Bell – The original is enshrined in the capital, but replicas can be found in courthouses and church steeples across the Republic. The tone they make when hit is alien to the nature of musical arts: I was struck by a painful headache and a bloody nose upon hearing it for the first time, though no one around me seemed to be effected. No symptoms occurred the second time.

Fighting Irish Elk - A rowdy beast, always looking for a good scrum. They practice their secret cervine battle-arts constantly, awaiting the next fight for territory and mates. I have even seen them attempt fisticuffs! (Though their gigantic antlers make this difficult).

Glacier-Clinger – Their limbs are hooked, to provide purchase on the icy cliff face. A long beak is used to drill into the ice to seek the red bacterial bleeds that serve as their primary source of nourishment. They can glide short distances on flaps of skin.

Paraceratherium – Domesticating one is a task only a few can manage. Success, however, is marked with a great and lasting honor to their clan. I met with an old man whose grandfather’s grandfather tamed one, and still the chiefs of other tribes honor him with gifts.

Pyroestatic – Mastery of fire brings a greater power with it. The spirit is set ablaze: the eyes burn, the voice sparks, what is old and dead is burnt away and there is only the light of reaction. Ah, freedom! Joy and life!

Sabretooth Stalker – A tusked lion that walks on its hind legs. Many of the local tribes believe that a witch can transform into the beast (and the other way around), so as to lay bloody curses on their neighbors.

Moss Mammoth – Their fur is heavy with green from the plants that call the gentle beasts home. In the spring the flowers bloom pink and white, making a most beautiful sight as the herds pass by. A crown of moss mammoth flowers is often considered an offer of marriage.

Murder Bird – Flightless birds that adore the act of killing. They will plan out their attacks in advance, for it is the only thing that gives them pleasure. Many make games of it, developing signature methods or calling-cards left for the grieving.

Eaters of the Dead – The dead are interred in sacred caves, so that they might not rise as these gray-skinned, yellow-toothed monsters. The woods at night are filled with their glowing eyes. It is common knowledge that killing one without destroying the heart in fire means that the cannibal’s spirit is free to possess another.

Story-Keeper – A man can only store so many stories – the greatest of the keepers have learned how they might hold onto a story when it is no longer in their head

Great White Buffalo – The goal is to hunt, to chase, never to kill. To seek it means to become greater, to be made wiser, to hone skills, to go beyond the horizon. Once a generation, certain young men and women go out from their homes to track it, and return with all the glories of kings.

All that's left after.

Lucabiel

Locals: Famished, diseased, clinging to life.
Wrestler: Big Oil – Heel. The man who sold the world.
Encounters:

Child-eater Rats – The protections are many – guard dogs, poisoned wastemeat, sigils and signs and talismans, armored cradles. The rats are too clever by half for these tricks.

Plague-Mold – Flooded buildings become breeding grounds for this particular rot. If the spores enter the lungs, one can look forward to a long future as a half-dead “blackspittle man”. The infection never kills outright, but it leaves in the victim a new voice, and song’s plucked out of memories not their own.

Abandoned Relief Worker – When the NGOs pulled out, they did so in a mad rush and piecemeal panic. Leftover supplies were scavenged and spent, leftover people found themselves with little to lose. Their baby blue helmets and once-fine firearms are a varnish of the forgotten past over the barbarism they have embraced.

Arcology Crawler – The extraordinarily wealthy retreated into personal paradises when disaster struck, and took all of their treasures with them. These armored eggshells are followed always by a crowd, either begging for scraps or howling for blood.

Dopamine Slug – The only source of joy and release from pain in this land. The slugdens are the center of the community; providing, food, shelter, guards, whores, and the daily fix. The slugfarmers are fantastically rich willing to pay handsomely for new breeds or a rival’s secrets.

Abbatoiran – Trained to cater to the richest of palates: panda foie gras. Tiger-eye soup. Manta-fin steaks. Mermaid caviar. Unicorn burger. With their clientele gone and their stocks vanished, they are left only with their knowledge of the knife

Favela Wobbegong – Children quickly learn to toss stones into flooded gutters before trying to cross, less they lose a foot. The sharks’ camouflage is a fine imitation of garbage.

Feral Designer Pet – Paradoxically, these freakish, shivering, bugeyed creatures have survived well in the absence of their masters. Perhaps they jumped ship to order rodentia, or they are simply too absurd to die.

Raggy-Man – Devil-figure of the local folklore. A man and a woman; the woman is described as once-beautiful, wearing a tattered evening gown, but now twisted so that her head faces the reverse of where her feet point. The man wears a hooded patchwork jacket, and bears a beard and eyebrows that cover everything of his face but his nose and too-wide mouth. They are seen in distant ruins, laughing, dancing, copulating, and always offering gifts of the past at terrible cost.

Pollutitan – Nameless fetus of Lucabiel, screaming for toxic pap, shuffling towards the City to be born.

Whisper to the Meat.

Carnesarx

Locals: Red, pink, white. Fleshy, soft, strong.
Wrestler: The Butcher – A giant with a strange accent. Sells meat to the audience while in the ring.
Encounters:

Daggermite – They have a single sharp tooth by which they gouge out a burrow in beast-flesh. The locals use them as tools, though poor preparation or training leads to a knife that turns on its owner.

Leukocyte Ooze – Internal guardians of the Beasts and perpetual banes of bloodwells and marrowmines. Those who dig too deep are greeted with a flood of devouring white antibodies.

Lord of the Ring-Worms – The typical worm might range from the length of a finger to a hundred feet or so. The lords, dormant for millennia, grow to the rang of tens of miles in length. The one at Obrol-Duul is attracting cultists from all over the country, hoping to see its waking.

Gristle-Grinders – These creatures are mostly mouth and very little brain, with rows of teeth that spin like sawblades. If provided with food or some entertainment, they can be domesticated as guards or tick-hunters.

Bloodletter Nymphs – Their right arm is a slender blade of bone, which they use to carve open beastflesh so that they may lap up the blood. Their mouths and necks are stained red, and their breasts are dotted in scabs.

Leathercloaks – Traveling tanners, forever shrouded in their veils of hide. Many folk consider them untrustworthy, unwanted, and even semi-human – none of my interactions implied anything of the sort.

Vegan Sabateurs – The introduction of invasive vegetable species to the local environment can wreck havoc on the local economy and society: tick farmers find their grazing lands decimated by broccoli, meatminers have to deal with veins of potatoes and carrots, haruspexes have no idea how to read omens from corn, and so on. As such, it is a favored tool of political agitators, who are often found hung by tendon-nooses declaring them as “leaf-eater”.

Rotwight – Regions of sepsis create all manner of putrid undead, but the worst is by far the rotwight. A soul severed from its body, it is submitted to an effectively infinite amount of spiritual decay (being without matter, it cannot ever fully rot away), and the the result is an ever-fouler monstrosity.

Maintenance Drone – The autonomous arm of the Central Processing Authority. They are fractal-finned spheres of black or white, with a red cyclopean eye. They float a few feet off the ground and might repair machinery under their glowing gaze.

Datavore – I was repeatedly warned to host multiple backups of my work, in case the local antibodies failed. While paper was safe there was little to be had, the Kyberni computational machines have yet to shake off their self-evolved disease. I made do by writing very small.

Cablesquid – It does not require water to live, instead making its home inside air vents and duct work.

Pistonbird – They hunt for bugs by tapping their blunt beaks against pipes and server-frames, driving prey out of hiding. The tip of each flight wing bears a glowing white dot.

Fileworm – The other bane of record-keeping here are the worms – instead of simply devouring information outright, they will corrupt and impregnate it, and the spawn will continue the cycle.

Black-Cap Hackjaw – They use their powerful underbitten jaws to crack open server banks and eat the innards. Their heads are so large and heavy that they can easily be thrown off balance.

Orb-weaver Pirate – The pirate-spiders were the most reliable source of supplies and news from the outside. They’re referred to by knowing locals as “my three problems”. Finding them is the first hurdle, affording them the second, and returning before the monitor drones notice your absence the third.

Rust-Eater – A scavenger of dying machines. The locals treat it as a sort of psychopomp, and so you will often see the placid beasts festooned with strings of lights and artificial garlands as they meander through the streets.

Servant Node – The CPA’s network does not reach everywhere in Kybern, despite claims to the contrary. These columnar servitors act as remote way-stations, powering and housing fleets of drones working in outlying regions.

Gilt Gargoyle – Misshapen monsters that lurk on eves and buttresses, with skins of gold leaf and pigeon shit. They know all your sins and love to remind you. On rainy days they take spit-shots at congregants on the steps below (with exceptional aim).

Formaldehyde Saint – The church keeps its virtuous dead in glass tanks, posed in poses of benediction. Impossibly valuable. The greatest cathedrals might have dozens of them. Children are often taught their mudras under a saint’s unseeing gaze.

Flagellant Atavist – Pain has stripped these hunchback’s minds down to the most reptile remnants. The priests officially denounce their actions, but make no moves to stop their preaching nor the growth of their movement.

God-Bearer – Virgin births are so commonplace that enterprising young women have set up support networks, where they meet weekly for coffee and to discuss the business of expecting divine beings: throwing up fire in the morning, prophetic dreams from the unborn, episodes of glossolalia, dealing with all the new and ridiculous titles men shower them with, and so on.

Prophet of Horns – Horns are a sign of divinely-granted insight. The fasting stylites cultivate them until they can no longer walk under the curling weight of their own inspiration.

Canonic Chirugeon – When they find a disagreement between the world and their law, they will change the world. Those who act contrary to the text must be pruned back into place. They dream of an eternal Orthodoxy, and would shift the Discape itself to create it.

Divine Cannibals – Their god made itself flesh (or was it imported from Carnesarx? The record is unclear) and they feast upon it. They commit their acts jovially and with decorum, but they maintain that there is no hope for the soul without it.

Tabernacle Moth – The interior of the cocoon is a site of transubstantiation. A man is put inside with the grubs, and months later is reborn anew. All wrongs remitted, all flesh cleaned.

Church-Drake – Sleepy, serpentine, and large enough to curl all the way around a cathedral until the doors are framed by the tip of its nose and the tip of its tail. Vibrant blue scales with a gold underbelly.

Knight-Absolver – They are sworn forever to mercy, and so may never injure. If they strike, they strike to kill. Their armor is ivory white, often muddied by slum-mud from their ministrations to the wretched and poor.

Studio Familiar – Halfway between a lemur and a rabbit, about nine inches tall, can float through the air with ease. Seem to live for holding palettes and fetching brushes.

Eggshell Anklebiter – Sleek, white, hairless. A more refined form of a general pest. Personal punting record: 10 yards.

Dancing Silhouette – The shadows on the walls beckon me to join them. I admit, I did so for a time, dancing to the unheard tones of a band only they could hear. There is a loneliness to these creatures, trapped as they are in their walls.

Ear Worm – A slim parasitic worm that roots itself in the ear canal. Triggers the nerves there to create the illusion of constant music.

Gallery Shuffler – Placid, saggy skinned quadrupeds that are found mostly in rented warehouses and studio apartments. They feed on leftover ideas and are terribly incapable

Interpretative Monster – It has no set properties, changing in means and meaning depending on the observer. Each specimen has a mildly variegated appearance, meaning that not only will it possess different attributes to two different people, but no single person will encounter it in the same way twice.

Deconstructor - Whatever they touch is broken down to fundamental parts. Signs are removed from their signifiers, chemical bonds dissolve. It appears as a black cloud of agitated vapor, occasionally swarming around the corpse of the man that released it.

Polluckite – A tornado made out of paint. If there was any body at the center of it I did not see it, having been blinded by most of a tube of Salubrious Seafoam No. 4.

Memeovore – They eat ideas, plucking them right out of the brain. This is quite interesting to watch, as they are able to mesmerize their victim, saw open their skull, pick out the ideas with the specialized grabbing fingers of the right hand, and safely-reattach the cranium in under three minutes.

Abstracticon – A collection of bright shapes arranged in the vague form of a flattened, cubist giant. They can only move sideways, being trapped in two dimensions, but yet can move sideways in any direction.

Tuesday, September 12, 2017

There are a few prompts that I'm saving for full posts, but all of those that didn't make enough material for will be bundled together here.

11th) Why
is the stone circle on the hill top broken?

Archbishop
Whalesh has broken the Treaty of Five Chiefs, overturning three generations of
co-existence between the Church and the Five Peoples. He has given his blessing
to those who would desecrate the High Places; bands of young men, converts to
the church and severed from the stars have taken up the call to topple the
marker stones, go out to smash the altars, to terrorize those who might sing
the Music of the Spheres Cosmic.

The
archbishop has likewise decreed the dissolution of all traditional marriages
and outlawed the old practices – only a church marriage is official now. The
astronomic arts, one practices with such care in the High Places, are likewise
now criminal.

12th)
What is there to do when stationed on an interstellar lighthouse?

Beamrider
relay stations are meant to be automated. They are places of utmost isolation –
buoys in a black sea. But still, some intelligence will live there.

They will
clone for themselves bodies, fork off branch versions to inhabit them. The
station becomes home then to elaborate theatrical dramas, generations long.
Sagas of love, loss, friendship, adventure, hate, retribution, redemption, all
the things that put butts in seats. Passing ships export the recordings to
wherever they might go.

Centuries
pass, and the solipsistic history of a vast computer mind speaking to itself
grows ever more byzantine. Eventually it will become too much, and the curtain
call comes. There will be a final, brilliant moment, before the cast dies to
the last, and at last there is fin.

The computer
might sleep then, for a time, before starting over again.

A corroded
metal ring, taken from the finger of a long-dead warrior. At least a thousand
years old, it has no monetary value and only faint historical worth. It was a
gift-ring once, a little bit of its old magic remains.

If the ring
is stolen, the thief shall reliving the owner’s memories in their dreams each
night – hours of bloodshed, friends hacked apart in the snow, keels splintering
under grinding ice, starvation and fire and loss. If the thief is confronted
with anything that might trigger these memories in their waking life, they must
pass a WIS save or trigger a fight/flight/panic response.

If the ring
is bestowed as a gift, it grants a blessing on its wearer – their hands shall
always be warm in the snow, and their dreams shall be of mead halls and brave
comrades. They cannot become exhausted through sleep deprivation.

Such was
brave Hrathulf’s reward…

16th)
Make an equipment list for a post apoc setting, using only things in 1 room of
your home. Garage and kitchen are easy mode.

In the room
you are able to find the following salvageable items:

Blue backpack

Satchel bag

Baseball cap with neck-flap

Ushanka

Deck of cards and bag of dice

Metal water bottle (21oz)

Sandals

Table-leg club

Icelandic flag scarf

Jacket

Flask

Bottle of antibacterial soap

Pocket knife

Nail clippers

The Silmarillion

17th)
What nations existed 500 years ago and how did they fall?

Sorang-Seh, pearl of the Sedsen Isles,
saw the crabs migrate. Their lagoons were left as empty as their stomachs. A few
of their stone structures still remain in the islands they once called home.

Ungalt, home
of the greatest jade carvers in the world, vanished in an instant, under the
burning ash of Mount Fotets.

Tluseí died
the slow death. A bloated government that could not keep order, a populace
turned upon itself by the ideologues that had wormed into places of power, a
changing climate and years of famine – all took a pound of flesh, until in
starvation, the nation devoured itself.

19th)
What single change would you make to a popular D&D setting and why?

I do not
particularly care for the Forgotten Realms. I understand the value of having a
generic base setting, but the thing about generic base settings is that
development is the DMs job. Give people the tub of Legos and let them go, don’t
waste time elaborating on it.

So, I
propose gigantic, status-quo shattering disaster followed by enough time to
allow what is rebuilt to become an entirely different setting. This would push
the Forgotten Realms out of the default position, and do a lot to remedy

Planescape
– Change the cosmology

I love
Planescape, both as it is and as a concept. As-is, there’s not much I would
change: maybe either getting rid of the Outlands and just having Sigil and the
planes, or moving all the important features of all the planes onto the
Outlands and sticking it all on a turtle or whale or bull and calling it a day
– but both of those are rooted in the feeling that the Outlands feel a bit
redundant when you have the City of Doors right there.

Conceptually,
thought there is a whole lot that can be done with “Here’s the multiverse. It’s
structured according to rules. There’s a city in the center.”

You can take
that concept and change the rules, the planes, the city, and come up with all
sorts of cool variants. A new take(s) on Planescape that embraces that sort of
variability would definitely be my cup of tea.

Wilderlands
of High Fantasy / City-State of the Invincible Overlord – Rebooted with DIY
sensibilities.

Pretty
self-explanatory, this one.

21st)
Most unexpected spell that helped you get past the walls of the Fortress of
See.

“It was Eoldar’s
Instant Hard-Boiled Egg what got us through that wall, I swear before the
gods. We’d managed to get in through the Whore’s Passage, like Brency told ya,
but were stuck just outside one of the inner guard posts and me leg was falling
dead asleep. Guard was right in your way and didn’t look to be moving and I
hadn’t got the space to get him drowsy with a bit of pixie dust. But he
was making himself some breakfast, and I made a lucky guess, and he turned
around for just enough for us to rush out and bag ‘im.”

22nd)
Milk Demons- besides Cecil, what are their names and what do they taste like?

It is very important
to remember that milk demons are a very different thing from demon milk. The
latter will not be explained here.

Demon-possessed
milk tastes like rotting sugarcane and turpentine. It cannot be spit out and
demands to be swallowed. The only effective means of removing milk demons is
through the pasteuxorcism process, where the possessed milk is heated and then
cooled in scripture-inscribed vats of cold iron.

Common milk
demon names, other than Cecil, are Calcigor, Fencil, Vixnilliar, and Lencelgan.

23rd) How
do gods work in your campaign? Does belief make them more powerful? Can
characters become one?

There are
gods, and then the gods of men.

Gods are
simple: A god is an entity that is worshiped, that is powerful enough to bestow
magic to those who follow it. Whether or not they are believed in or followed
has no impact on their power or scope, they exist beyond humanity’s belief in
them. They might be called the Old Gods

The gods of
men are different, for they are created by human beings. This is not a
conscious effort, but rather a sort of naturally-occurring effect: mass exerts
gravitational pull, humanity creates gods. Appropriately, these gods are
representative of spheres of human life and existence, and live within the tangled
mess of ethics and philosophy that man finds himself in.

The gods of
man can fade over time as their followers die out or the world changes around
them, eventually vanishing when there is no niche left for them. They cannot
die like the aforementioned gods.

It is
possible to achieve apotheosis through the magic that births the gods of men
(such as in the case of DOG), but it is difficult and dangerous.

24th) If
the object closest to your left hand right now was a magic item in your
campaign, what would it do?

Item: Black
cylindrical speaker, roughly size of a grenade.

When the Black
Speaker is thrown, it will produce a cacophonous screaming in an abyssal
language. The noise will rarely form a coherent statement, but it is
spectacularly loud and aggressive.

The effect
will last for about a minute, after which point the Black Speaker will
be powerless until the next dawn.

25th) The
last thing you drank is a potion. What are its effects?

Dihidrogen
Monoxide is a most pernicious and deadly poison – flavorless, scentless,
common and deadly.Laws passed to
control the substance termed the “universal solvent” have done little to halt
its spread – this is due in part to the fact that it might be made into a
potion that can purge Dehyd Demons from the brain.

Yes, this
toxic substance, destroyer of neighborhoods and toppler of lives, is the only
known method of fortifying the brain against Dehyd Demons and purging them from
the mind. The drinker finds themselves stirred from languor and in possession
of an icy focus. Their eyes are opened and the illusions of the Dehyd Demons
are cast aside.

26th)
Your childhood pet is now a monster. How is it going to kill me?

“Locals say
it was a big cat, sir.”

“How big?”

“Big enough
that it shouldn’t be here. You don’t find tigers at this latitude, sir.”

“Anything
else?”

“It was
gray, didn’t make any noise,and tracked
sand everywhere.”

“And carried
off a prize cow with it.”

“We found
the cow, sir. Just over that hill. Half the cow, at least. Lots of sand around
it.”

“No sign of
tracks or fur?”

“None.”

“Might as
well put out a posting for those vagrants at the Yeller and Trout. Decent
reward, nothing fancy.”

“Consider it
done, sir.”

27th) So
what's with that overly-elaborate locked box?

Within that
lacquered box lie the relics of St. Ren-jain, holy hermaphrodite and martyr of
the Opal Steps. The relics include:

The fragmented skull, broken from the
terrible fall.

The obsidian dagger with which their
throat was cut.

A drop of breast milk, on which the
Lost Infant was fed.

Crumbs from the Banana Bread Miracle,
where Executor Yw was led to believe.

29th)
Goblins are great. Why or why not?

Goblins are
the greatest, and they are the greatest because they are goblins.

Humans have
a tendency to become full of themselves. To think that the universe is ordered
to their desires. To think that they are masters of the world, instead of its
momentary stewards. To think that everything they do is serious and important.

Goblins
reject this. They are here to take the piss, to be the gadfly, to destabilize
the comfortable and remind the powerful of where they stand. They are the folk
of chaos: of pratfalls and fart jokes and civil disobedience.

A goblin
warren is based around their queen broodmother, who is protected by her sterile
daughters and sisters (jack pucks) and served by her swarms of sons and brothers. Hobs are those goblins that run the Market. The Goblin
Kings have gone away, but everyone knows that one day they will return.

**

And that's the end of the little ones. It was a great deal of fun, so many thanks to +Beloch Shrike and the others who helped fill out the list.